Telecom Trends

A couple weeks ago, I wrote about the announcement of a suite of internet measurement tools released with Google's support. I had observed that the test sites were overwhelmed with traffic.

A reader wrote me to say that he finally connected with Google's Measurement Lab website and he has some suggestions for future developments.

M-Lab is promoted as the result of a small group of academics having been approached by Google to research ways to provide users with tools to test their broadband connections. It offers these tools:

• Network Diagnostic Tool: Test your connection speed and receive sophisticated diagnosis of problems limiting speed.
• Glasnost: Test whether BitTorrent is being blocked or throttled.
• Network Path and Application Diagnosis: Diagnose common problems that impact last-mile broadband networks.
• DiffProbe (coming soon): Determine whether an ISP is giving some traffic a lower priority than other traffic.
• NANO (coming soon): Determine whether an ISP is degrading the performance of a certain subset of users, applications, or destinations.

My disciple suggests, with his tongue firmly planted in his cheek, that researchers may want to work on the following:

1. wwwglasnostic – think www + glasnost + diagnostic – It would be a test to determine whether a content provider on the internet has done a special deal with any government to block politically “sensitive” information. Don’t the Chinese people have a right to know the degree and form of censorship that is being implemented re: certain subjects?
2. Ad$Probe – It would measure the amount of web advertising revenue that is being earned (and by whom) as a result of a user’s online wandering. Don’t internet users have a right to know how much money is being made as a result of their viewing or using anything online?

Any suggestions for other tools? Students - get working on your projects!

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